Image Lake reflection of Glacier Peak
— the lake the mountain shows up in.
Not only on a wall.
“Image Lake sits at about 6,050 feet on Miners Ridge in the Glacier Peak Wilderness, roughly sixteen trail miles from the nearest road end on the Suiattle River. From its small bench, Glacier Peak rises south across the Suiattle valley, 10,541 feet of glaciated andesite, the most remote of the Cascade volcanoes. When the lake is still, the mountain doubles in the water. The photograph has been made so often it became part of a Sierra Club campaign in the 1960s. The hike in is a long one. People who have done it speak of arriving in the last light and waking to the reflection before the wind comes up.
Image Lake reflection of Glacier Peak, on ceramic.
Each tile is finished by hand in our Knoxville studio. Artwork is slowly infused into the ceramic surface under high heat and pressure, and rests beneath a thin glossy finish. The colour lives in the surface, not on top of it.
Pick any four 4-inch tiles — National Parks you've been to, a Smokies set, the four seasons of one place. $ for a set of , cork-backed, ready to live on the table.
The place, in three passes.
Image Lake is a small subalpine tarn on the eastern shoulder of Miners Ridge, in the Glacier Peak Wilderness of Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest. It sits at about 6,050 feet, roughly sixteen trail miles from the nearest road end on the Suiattle River, with no shorter approach. Glacier Peak rises south across the Suiattle valley, 10,541 feet and almost continuously snowbound, the most isolated of the five Cascade volcanoes. The Suiattle River trailhead closed for years after the 2003 floods washed out the Suiattle River Road and reopened to the upper trailhead in 2014. Most parties hike in over two or three days and base-camp on the bench above the lake.
What makes Image Lake unusual is not its size, which is small, but its position. The lake sits in a shallow bench on Miners Ridge that faces Glacier Peak directly across the Suiattle valley. The water is still in the morning before the upslope wind comes off the river. On clear mornings the entire mountain repeats in the surface: Disappointment Peak, the summit, the Cool Glacier and the Chocolate Glacier draped over its eastern face. The photograph has been made enough times to define a generation of Cascade conservation imagery; a Philip Hyde image of the lake was central to the Sierra Club's 1960s campaign against an open-pit copper mine proposed for nearby Plummer Mountain.
Reaching Image Lake is a serious wilderness undertaking. The shortest approach is the Suiattle River Trail to Miners Ridge Trail, about sixteen miles one way with roughly 4,500 feet of elevation gain. The Suiattle River Road, badly damaged in floods in 2003, reopened to the upper trailhead in 2014 after years of closure. Wilderness camping rules apply: designated sites on the bench above the lake protect fragile subalpine vegetation, and campfires are prohibited within a quarter-mile of the lake. Snow holds at the lake into July most years, and afternoon storms can build quickly over the volcano. The viewing window is roughly mid-August through late September.